I must admit I quite enjoyed this film. I think it works best as an over-the-top parody of such movies as "Lock, stock..." or "Snatch". The plot makes no sense, rhyme or reason. If you're after a cohesive plot, you'd better look elsewhere. The characters are at times funny and at the same time verging on annoying (think the character played by Brad Pitt in "Snatch", only stretched to the entire cast and entire duration of the film). Absolutely no way for suspension of disbelief here. So, again, if getting immersed in an action film is your thing, look elsewhere. All in all: noisy, clumsy, over-the-top, silly, but for some unknown reason the overall experience for me was actually not so terrible.
Reviews
3 Reviews
Wesele
(1973)
A decent film based on a brilliant play
25 January 2005
Warning: Spoilers
This film by Andrzej Wajda is based on the play "The Wedding" written around y. 1900 by Stanislaw Wyspianski. Wyspianski, a playwright, poet, painter, sculptor, architect, designer and a bit of an eccentric, arguably reached his creative peak in "The Wedding". A real event - the marriage of an upper class poet to a peasant girl in a village near Cracow, Poland - enabled Wyspianski, who actually witnessed the wedding as a guest, to mix current social commentary and a bit of satire with some seriously visionary (what with all the absinthe) musings on Polish troubled past and present. The play is superb in conveying the diverse language of the characters, who range from artistic and bourgeois friends of the bridegroom to the local country folk speaking in a thick but vibrant dialect.
The whole plot is set during a single night in the peasant house where the wedding takes place. It is happening on two connected planes: on one hand, realistic dancing, drinking and socializing, where the culture clash between different circles of guests allows for interesting observations, on another hand, symbolic encounters of individual guests with the ghosts that come to haunt them. The ghosts - mostly significant figures from Poland's history and culture - can be understood as personifications of ideas, in line with the symbolist trends of the period, or simply as drunken hallucinations of the guests.
Gradually, the plot takes the direction towards setting up an armed uprising against Poland's oppressors. The upper class (nobility) is supposed to lead and the peasantry is supposed to contribute muscle. One of the ghosts even provides the magical golden bugle to be used for the decisive call to arms at dawn. However, as the dawn comes, it turns out that the upper class failed to take the lead and all they're battling is their own hangovers, and the golden bugle got lost because of the selfishness and clumsiness of the peasants. Instead of the uprising, the plot ends with "cursed", stupefying dancing.
Faced with the task of transferring all this to the language of film, Andrzej Wajda chose the path of pronounced material realism. The wedding room is confined and stuffy, the dance music played by actual folklore musicians is blaring all the time and at times drowns the dialogue, the acting and costumes are all very realistic. This provides for an interesting clash with the theatrical structure of the play. On the other hand, the camera work is very dynamic and at times disjointed, which quite convincingly represents the state of drunkenness common to country weddings like this.
In my opinion, this film works best for people familiar with the original text, which means it may be not so impressive for international audiences. However, for all the art-house buffs out there it should be interesting enough to have a look. Certainly one of the high points in the work of Andrzej Wajda, the celebrated, if slightly overrated, maestro of Polish cinema.
The whole plot is set during a single night in the peasant house where the wedding takes place. It is happening on two connected planes: on one hand, realistic dancing, drinking and socializing, where the culture clash between different circles of guests allows for interesting observations, on another hand, symbolic encounters of individual guests with the ghosts that come to haunt them. The ghosts - mostly significant figures from Poland's history and culture - can be understood as personifications of ideas, in line with the symbolist trends of the period, or simply as drunken hallucinations of the guests.
Gradually, the plot takes the direction towards setting up an armed uprising against Poland's oppressors. The upper class (nobility) is supposed to lead and the peasantry is supposed to contribute muscle. One of the ghosts even provides the magical golden bugle to be used for the decisive call to arms at dawn. However, as the dawn comes, it turns out that the upper class failed to take the lead and all they're battling is their own hangovers, and the golden bugle got lost because of the selfishness and clumsiness of the peasants. Instead of the uprising, the plot ends with "cursed", stupefying dancing.
Faced with the task of transferring all this to the language of film, Andrzej Wajda chose the path of pronounced material realism. The wedding room is confined and stuffy, the dance music played by actual folklore musicians is blaring all the time and at times drowns the dialogue, the acting and costumes are all very realistic. This provides for an interesting clash with the theatrical structure of the play. On the other hand, the camera work is very dynamic and at times disjointed, which quite convincingly represents the state of drunkenness common to country weddings like this.
In my opinion, this film works best for people familiar with the original text, which means it may be not so impressive for international audiences. However, for all the art-house buffs out there it should be interesting enough to have a look. Certainly one of the high points in the work of Andrzej Wajda, the celebrated, if slightly overrated, maestro of Polish cinema.
Pan Tadeusz
(1999)
Mediocre film based on a literary masterpiece
7 September 2004
That's very true: this film's redeeming quality (if any) are the dialogues, and also narrator's voice-overs, which have been taken verbatim from "Pan Tadeusz", the Polish 19th century verse epic by Adam Mickiewicz. Mickiewicz was an excellent poet (one of the strongest in Polish language, and of decent standing in European literature of 19th century), and "Pan Tadeusz", written in 1834, is one of his peak works. The text, written in syllabotonic rhymed verse, is at time funny, at times touching, but always flowing and vibrant. The epic tells a story from the lives of Polish lesser gentry in eastern part of the former Commonwealth of Poland (these parts are now in Lithuania or Byelarus) in the times of Napoleon's conquests. The plot includes a little bit of love story, a little bit of war (skirmishes, really), mystery, intrigue, resistance against Poland's occupiers, scenes of everyday life - all with a good measure of nostalgia thrown in, as it was written by Mickiewicz as emigree in Paris, with the patriotic goal to cheer up (literally, in Polish, "to strengthen the hearts") of other emigrees and of Poles in the partitioned and non-existing Poland, at the time shortly after yet another unsuccessful uprising against the Russian Empire.
"Pan Tadeusz", the movie, is a costume drama directed by Andrzej Wajda, the Polish director with some notable previous work under his belt. Into this film he brings mainly his experience and routine as filmmaker. The acting, with few exceptions, fails to impress, the actors simply mill around and recite the splendid lines by Mickiewicz. The camera-work is passable, with some nice shots of the beautiful locations. Also scenography and costumes are decent. What stands out is the music by the renowned Wojciech Kilar. But then again, it is standing out against the backdrop of a, frankly, not very exciting movie.
All in all: the most interesting feature of this film is unfortunately lost in translation from rhymed verse in 19th century Polish.
"Pan Tadeusz", the movie, is a costume drama directed by Andrzej Wajda, the Polish director with some notable previous work under his belt. Into this film he brings mainly his experience and routine as filmmaker. The acting, with few exceptions, fails to impress, the actors simply mill around and recite the splendid lines by Mickiewicz. The camera-work is passable, with some nice shots of the beautiful locations. Also scenography and costumes are decent. What stands out is the music by the renowned Wojciech Kilar. But then again, it is standing out against the backdrop of a, frankly, not very exciting movie.
All in all: the most interesting feature of this film is unfortunately lost in translation from rhymed verse in 19th century Polish.
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